My internship days

Finally, I've started my internship which is the last part of my study abroad program.
I really feel time flies so fast since the first day of my internship. I can't believe that I've got only two weeks left.

My intern workplace is called "dogstar". This is fashion company that was created by Japanese woman designer. By the way, I don't know why she named like that so I should ask her next week.
The workplace is a kind of studio. Therefore, they do everything such as selling cloths, checking online store and packing, creating new design and even making cloths from a fabric!

To be honest, I'm not interested in fashion industry. So I was worried about whether my internship was going to go well or not before I started. I've already experienced two weeks and what I can say now is 'so interesting!!'. Although I still don't think I want to do a job related to fashion, I am so interested in the workplace itself.
The workers and work environment are so nice. I enjoy observing how they work and what they do. There are Australian, Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese and so on. The number of people who was born in Australia or whose first language is English is less than those who speak English as their second language.
And one day, I saw a Japanese manager spoke to a Chinese person in China cutting factory about how to cut their new cloths' fabric while sending email to Korean factory to negotiate which fabrics she wanted to import for the cloths. And after that, she talked with dogstar's Vietnamese sewer about colour or slight detail about new clothes because he is going to make an ideal sample in Brisbane and bring it to Vietnam factory so that Vietnam factory can mass produce perfect according to the sample one. Because everyone in the studio want to make new style cloths elaborately, they were taking care even 1cm difference.
What I was surprised was how global their works are and how important English is. I knew there are many non-native English speakers work in Australia or English-spoken country. I knew current business is worldwide. I knew English is a common language. But I've never felt it. I've never experienced it. I was totally stunned. Now, I learnt them in real. At the same time, I realised that of course the high level of English and a lot of knowledge is important, but surely there is a more important thing beyond these skills. I can't say exactly what it is in one word but something like people's mind or experiences are crucial. I think I should find them by myself in the future.           

September...

I have got less than three months until I will be back to Japan.
When I am thinking about going back to Japan, I have a kind of ambiguous feeling. If someone ask me whether you want to stay here or not, I would say "yes...but no."
I know once I will leave Brisbane, it is quite difficult to return here because of time and money problem. I like Australian environment and atmosphere. In addition, I like Australian people's way to think. And most importantly, here is the environment that I am surrounded by English.
However, recently I have been thinking many things that I want to do in Japan such as to eat sushi for just 1$, to start part-time job, go to a driving school to get a driver licence and meet my friends. I listen to many Korean, although obviously I should focus on English. I guess these thoughts and behaviours are just to escape from my UQ life.
In UQ life, I always feel I can do nothing. Not only lack of English skill but also that of knowledge. I faced many situations that when a discussion started, I fully understood the question but I could not came up with my own idea. In the other time, I had an idea but was not able to express it in English. I was disappointed by myself and frustrated many times.
But, I am sure I have learnt a lot of things through this study abroad.

So here is things that I want to do.
Already planned: Surfing, to go to DFO, to watch Riverfire.
Not yet: to do Aussie BBQ, to go to movie world and night-time mt-cootha, to explore my surburb, to eat various kinds of food as much as I can, to finish assignments, to buy souvenirs.
I will try to make my last 3 months special and meaningful for me.

Session Break

After I had got my IELTS result and finished EAP 1 course, my session break started.
However, in fact, I had nothing special things to do during the break.  If any, visiting "Dream World" might be a little bit special thing. Before the visiting, I went city, Indooroopilly and South Bank to use my go card more than 9 times in order to go Dream World for free. The things that I've done in those places are eating, eating and eating! I tried  Mexican food, Singaporean food, chocolate pizza and so on.
In short, Dream World was nice. There are many rides and places that you can enjoy. And you can catch a train from central station so it's not so difficult to get there.
My friends tried to ride the "Giant Drop" (maybe) that is one of the famous rides in the world, and they did. One of my friends' face was so terrible. I was too scary to try that one, so I didn't. But now I regret not to try it.
The peaceful session week is over. New session has been started. I've got many things to do but I'm trying to enjoy new environment as much as I can. Otherwise, there are only obstacles for me so I may feel a lot of stress. I find it easy to understand lectureres' English because they speak clearly. The problem is listening to students' English. Australia students' English are like bullets. But I always feel they have lots of ideas and express these which is really good and I respect them in that points.
After all, I'll study hard to enhance my English skills.

IELTS

Yesterday, June 27th, was my only last chance to try to get 6.5. Many my friends had been studying hard for yesterday. I was able to make efforts because my friends inspired and helped me. If I was alone, I would not have studied hard.

Before I came Australia, getting 6.5 was like a  tremendous iron wall that last above sky for me. Some people said that IELTS is not so difficult if i can get a knack of studying but I had never believed it. About three months have been passed since I arrived and started to focus on studying IELTS. Now I can say IELTS is not such a tremendous wall but a high wood wall that I can see the top edge of the wall. It is of course still difficult for me, and I do not think I can get 8 or more, but I found I can break for it and might go over it.

I can only wait my result now, so I'll enjoy and be relax this two weeks. I have done one step of studying abroad, but I still have about 6 months. I keep studying English and I'll enjoy learning English more.  

Hello May

Today is May 17. I feel cold when I wake up at the early morning.

Speaking of May, my name "Mai" is always called "May" by Australian people. I've never misunderstood my name in Japan, of course. I don't know why people call me May but It's like a new experience so I don't mind.

I guess I should talk about study.
After the session break, I've started studying in EAP class.
What do you think of EAP? How do you feel? Compared to the General class, it's a little bit tough and quite academic. However, I believe I can learn many things in the class so it's okay.

I guess I'm not good at writing a blog. In fact, I prefer reading and writing comments for my friends.
But I'll keep writing. Do my best...!

My First Four Weeks in Brisbane

I arrived Brisbane four weeks ago. For me, this one month is really long and also really short. Australian food are good, except Vegemite. I think people are kind and friendly. I went to South Bank, Central Brisbane and Indooroopilly in this 4 weeks.

I met many people who are from various countries. I could talk with Thai, Saudi Arabia, China, France and so on. I think I might not have such opportunity in Japan.Talking with other countries people is fun because I can listen to their story such as people and languages. I feel it is like a world trip.

These conversations give me a little difficult feeling.When I talk with them in English, I always struggled to use English. Sometime this situation gives me more English interests, but sometime I'm frustrated myself. 

Through these thoughts, I always think languages are interesting and have strong power. At the moment, my English skill  isn't enough to tell exactly what I want to say.  I still have seven months before I back to Japan.

Only I need to do is to keep studying English.